232 THE GERMAN REFORMATION. A.D. 1517 To 1580.
Eck sent the bull to the rector of the University of Wittenberg, Oct. 3, 1520, with the request to prohibit the teaching of any of the condemned propositions of Luther, and threatening that, in case of disobedience, the Pope would recall all the liberties and privileges of the university. The professors and counselors of the Elector declined the promulgation for various reasons.
The Elector Frederick was on the way to Aachen to assist at the coronation of Charles V., but was detained at Cologne by the gout. There he received the bull from Aleander after the mass, Nov. 4, and was urged with eloquent words to execute it, and to punish Luther or to send him to Rome; but he cautiously deferred an answer, and sought the advice of Erasmus in the presence of Spalatin. ‘The famous scholar gave it as his judgment, that Luther’s crime consisted in having touched the triple crown of the Pope and the stom: achs of the monks;! he also wrote to Spalatin, after the interview, that the Pope’s bull offended all upright men by its ferocity and was unworthy of a meek vicar of Christ.? The Elector was thus confirmed in his favorable view of Luther. He sent Spalatin to Wittenberg, where some students had left in consequence of the bull; but Spalatin was encouraged, and found that Melanchthon had about six hundred, Luther four hundred hearers, and that the church was crowded whenever Luther preached. A few weeks afterward the Pope’s bull was burnt.
1 «ὁ Lutherus peccavit in duobus, nempe quod tetigit coronam Pontificis et ventres monachorum.”? Spalatin, Annal. 28 sq.
2 “ἐ Bulle sevitia probos omnes offendit, ut indigna mitissimo Christi vicario.”? Erasmus soon afterwards called back his Axiomata pro causa Lutheri, which he had sent to Spalatin. They were, however, published (Erl. ed. of Luther’s Op. Lat., vol. V. 238-242). About the same time he advised the Emperor to submit the case of Luther to impartial judges of different nations, or to a general council. See Gieseler, IV. 53 sq., Am. ed.
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ὃ 47. THE BULL OF EXCOMMUNICATION. 235
NOTES. —THE BULL OF EXCOMMUNICATION.
As I do not find the bull in any of the Protestant or Roman-Catholic church histories which I have consulted (except the Annals of Raynaldus), I give it here in full as transcribed from an original copy in possession of the Astor Library, New York (probably the only one on the American Continent), together with facsimiles of titlepage and first page. The pamphlet contains twenty pages, small quarto, and is printed continuously, like ancient MSS. I have divided it into sections, with headings, and noted the departures of Cocquelines and Raynaldus from the original.